Trump's isolationism meets his Venezuela exception
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
President Trump speaks to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Fla., after announcing U.S. plans to run Venezuela. Photo: Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images
Hours after capturing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, President Trump announced the U.S. will "run the country" — acting on a threat he's maintained for years, even as he denounced nation building elsewhere.
Why it matters: Trump built his foreign policy brand on rejecting intervention, repeatedly vowing America would stop toppling regimes and rebuilding nations.
- But he's consistently carved out an exception for Venezuela because of its proximity and possession of the world's largest oil reserves.
The big picture: "We're going to run it, essentially, until such time that we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition," Trump said Saturday at Mar-a-Lago, outlining plans for U.S. oil companies to invest billions in Venezuela's infrastructure.
- He called the policy "the Donroe Doctrine," a play on the Monroe Doctrine, adding: "American dominance in the Western Hemisphere won't be questioned again."
Between the lines: The policy mirrors post-invasion strategies in Iraq and Afghanistan that Trump once criticized: U.S. military presence protecting economic interests, American oversight of government functions, promises of an eventual transition to local control.
What Trump has previously promised
Trump's rejection of nation building set him apart from the old-guard Republican establishment when he first entered the 2016 presidential election.
- In 2016, Trump promised in his first foreign policy campaign speech, "We're getting out of the nation-building business and instead focusing on creating stability in the world."
- Just before taking office the first time, in December 2016, he said, "We will stop racing to topple foreign regimes that we know nothing about, that we shouldn't be involved with."
More recently, at the Libertarian Party convention in 2024, Trump said, "We believe that the job of the United States military is not to wage endless regime change, wars around the globe, senseless wars. The job of the United States military is to defend America from attack and invasion here at home."
Trump never ruled out Venezuela action
Yes, but: While campaigning against nation building broadly, Trump has always carved out an exception for Venezuela, citing its proximity to the United States.
Context: In August 2017, he said he wasn't "going to rule out a military option" for Venezuela, calling it "our neighbor" where "the people are suffering."
- He distinguished the nation's problems from the Middle East by saying it was "not very far away" from the U.S.
- In September 2018, he again said of Maduro's regime, "It's a regime that, frankly, could be toppled very quickly by the military if the military decides to do that."
- In 2023, he lamented that when he left his first term, "Venezuela was ready to collapse. We would have taken it over. We would have gotten all that oil. It would have been right next door. But now, we're buying oil from Venezuela. So, we're making a dictator very rich."
- In September, in his United Nations address, he said: "We've recently begun using the supreme power of the United States military to destroy Venezuelan terrorists and trafficking networks led by Nicolas Maduro. To every terrorist thug smuggling poisonous drugs into the United States of America, please be warned that we will blow you out of existence."
What's next: Trump has not specified how long U.S. forces will remain in Venezuela or what conditions must be met for the "judicious transition" Trump mentioned.
The bottom line: Trump's plan for Venezuela conflicts with his broad anti-intervention rhetoric, but it also matches his long-held special exception for the country.
